


Bad's the Best of Us

by TheFantabulousPandemonium



Series: Murder Considered as One of the Fine Arts [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: ANBU shenanigans, Aftermath of Violence, Anbu Hatake Kakashi, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Present Tense, Team Dynamics, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-03-08
Packaged: 2019-03-22 18:37:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13770120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFantabulousPandemonium/pseuds/TheFantabulousPandemonium
Summary: ANBU Squad Five-Seven-One has been doing this whole 'babysitting the demon kid' thing from the shadows for close to three years now. You would think Commander Hound and his entire squad would take the hint that they know what they're doing but, no, they've got to stick their noses where they don't belong.And from the shadows just doesn't cut it anymore.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here, have some self-indulgence I wrote while waiting for l4d2 to download. chapters are pretty short 'cause im trying to get back into the swing of things with a new laptop.

"He's in trouble again." Bear says with a sigh. The sounds of a scuffle echoes up to their perches atop one of the larger buildings in Konoha, drenched in a mess of shadows and telephone wires, as well as a child's voice spitting words they most definitely should not know. To her right, Monkey rolls her shoulders in a loose motion.

"Fifty ryo says he started it." The grin in her voice is perceptible even at such a low volume. Bear snorts and Rat gives her a look made imperceptible by his mask but easily recognized as rude by his teammates. It's all in the eye-slits. And the ungentlemanly gesture.

"No dice." Boar says. "We all know who started it this time."

The squad is silent for a moment, the breeze swirling crumpled pieces of paper and drying petals around them.

"Let's just get tonight over with." Rat's drawl cuts through the thick atmosphere just as a pained shout does. He drops to the street below them in a crouch and disappears into the mouth of the alley they've been watching for almost an hour. Bear follows, less than a step behind him. Monkey cocks her head towards Boar.

"Fifty ryo on those two doing something unpleasant." He says. She shakes her head and they both turn towards Bear's raised voice stopping the shouting match in its tracks.

"Sucker's bet. A hundred on Hound finding out within the next shift." He actually chuckles at that, following Monkey down with far less than her effortless grace.

The kid's safe now, at least, wrapped tight around Bear's midsection and winding down. He looks a little scuffed in the moonlight, with a bruise on his face and a large stain down the front of his shirt. It's dark enough to be either blood, tears, or a mixture of the two, but Boar's leaning toward the former option. There's no visible lacerations to deal with, however, and he counts that as an improvement over the other guy.

Rat leads the attacker away under Monkey's watchful stare, with claw-marks up and down his arms and blood dripping from his chin. Neither seem inclined to help stop the bleeding; it's what he deserves.

All of Squad Five-Seven-One is in agreement on that.

But it also leaves Bear and Boar to get the kid put together and home without any more trouble. His teammate's pained expression is evident in her stiff posture and the fact that there's a tiny hand knotted hard enough in her long, black hair that she's leaning into it. It'd be funny if she wouldn't murder him for smiling at it. Boar does his best to appear nonthreatening underneath his mask, approaching the pair slowly.

"Hey, kiddo." He says. A soft noise and watery blue eyes answer back. " You were awfully brave just now. Can you show me what hurts so we can help you?"

The kid hesitates, looking back at Bear for reassurance, and only turns back to him when she nods.

"Boar works in the hospital when he isn't being big and scary, Naruto-chan. He can make it not hurt anymore." She murmurs, and gets another noise out of him. Little fingers release her hair, and Boar can already see the sigh of relief before it ever leaves her lips, but they touch at the stain on his shirt with a wince. That's probably not good. He calls up the least invasive diagnostic jutsu he knows, a flicker of green darting across his palm.

"This shouldn't hurt, alright? It'll only get warmer and a little brighter where we need to look." Boar pauses before actually touching him, waiting for a slight nod before curling a gloved hand around a smaller. He doesn't miss the way the kid hesitates. Instead, Boar catalogues.

Left ankle, probably sprained, but nothing a compress won't fix. Several small cuts on the outside of both legs, about the height a kunai's tip would be. More coordination would be the fix for that. Or rubber tips.

A lump of a bruise on the underside of his jaw, probably from where the attacker swung at him, would go away on its own. A bright gash hiding under the collar of his shirt, maybe a knife wound, from the shape of it, but there's no indication of torn clothing and it's not bleeding at all.

Boar frowns, watching the glow fade to almost nothing before his eyes before letting go. Naruto stares down at his own chest, fascinated, before looking back up at him.

"You did that, ANBU-san?" The awe in his voice is a little uncomfortable. He reaches out to ruffle the kid's hair in lieu of messing up his own in frustration.

"Nah, kiddo." He says. Bear tilts her head up, listening for something on the wind. It's getting about time for the second patrol to come around. "You did that all by yourself. Let's get you home, yeah?"

The rest of the night goes smoothly.

For them.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you wanna guess which clans the squad belongs to, feel free. I might do like a shoutout or request if you get it right. there's a couple vague hints throughout.

The most the police station can charge the attacker for is disorderly conduct, or so the two officers on duty say. Monkey knows they could go for assault if they really wanted to. But she says nothing, watching the hand off with a detached air. From the way the officers speak it's easy enough to tell they're friends with the man.

Unprofessional.

"See what you can scrounge up for an incident report." Rat orders when they leave with the certainty that Monkey will follow it. She will, of course, because he's the captain of Squad Five-Seven-One and she respects that. But he doesn't have to be so snippy about it.

"Yeah, yeah." She says.

Rat's shoulders ease down from their tight line but his frame's still tense. The path from the station to Headquarters is short and familiar, and she's already thinking about ignoring him and getting into bed. They've still got Bear and Boar to worry about, however, before the shift is actually over.

"You think they'll want some of Kitchen's coffee?" Monkey asks, if only to fill the silence. Rat makes a disinterested noise. She rolls her eyes at him, though it goes unnoticed beneath her mask.

"Right, stupid question. Here's a better one: are you gonna go find them or start the informal report first?"

"It'll be easier to fill the old man in while they're with me." Rat says, shrugging. Monkey nods, wrapping her arm around his shoulders and clicking their masks together in mockery of kissing his cheek.

"Gimme a half-hour and I'll be on my way, dear." She lets her voice go sugary-sweet before ducking into Headquarters so he can't yell at her about it.

It's not a big building, really. Mostly a normal-looking office partway between the Hokage's tower and the hospital. There's a desk and its associated secretary, a reinforced door behind said secretary, and a long winding staircase that leads to a warren of tunnels beneath the bustling city. Monkey greets the chuunin with a wave, checking herself in automatically once the secretary hands her a clipboard with a bored look on his face.

"Can I borrow a few sheets and a pen if you've got some to spare?" She asks, handing it back. The chuunin nods, opening a drawer in the desk and puling out a few loose sheets for her. He doesn't hand her a pen like she hopes.

"I've only got one good one." He says after, apologetic. She eyes the pen in his hand for a moment, squinting at it through her mask, and decides it isn't worth it. Instead, she heads into the tunnels, passing both recruits and agents on her way towards the lower level's Kitchen. Her multitude of pockets prove useless as well.

Though, she does find a dried-up old pen, a handful of brightly-coloured sugary candy, and last month's mission report. Monkey tucks the last one back into its place, discarding the first with the next recruit she sees and popping the rest into her mouth. They're a little stale, but who knows how long they've been in her pocket.

She slips through the sealed doors that cut Kitchen off from the rest of the warren, the warm smell of something cooking hitting her, and barely catches herself from running face-first into the one person she absolutely did not want to see tonight.

"Commander!" She says with as much false cheer as she can manage without dipping into total bullshit, half-saluting and trying to edge around him at the same time. Hound isn't wearing the animal mask she knows better, but there's a distinct lack of anonymity this deep in Headquarters that most folks don't bother if they aren't just stopping in for a bite to eat. He's weird and intimidating without it, and it doesn't help that he towers over her. "Sorry about that, sir. Just making a midnight coffee run for the team, you know?"

Hound frowns at her from behind the second, tighter-fitting mask. At least, Monkey thinks he does. It's hard to read someone's expression through shinobi-grade fabric and he isn't the most expressive person she knows. She must have been quiet for a second too long.

"What happened to Naruto." He says. It's not a question. Monkey winces behind her mask. Even if she didn't have access to the Commander's file, it's painfully obvious how much he cares for the kid despite the miles of red tape the Hokage slapped on him.

"Nothing we couldn't handle?" She hates lying to her superiors, which is what Rat and Boar would do. Bear usually has her hands too full to be ambushed by Strike Team Eta, but it doesn't stop them from trying. Hound's only visible eye narrows.

"Look," Monkey says, raising her hands in surrender, "it honestly wasn't anything too bad. We cleaned it up in less than ten minutes."

"Someone attacked him." Hound counters. She huffs, stalking towards the Kitchen instead of answering.

He matches her pace with ease, just inside her personal space, and waits. Monkey grabs three cups of the coffee, taking a moment to adjust it to her teammates likings - cream for Bear, drowning in sugar for Boar, and pitch black for Rat.

"Naruto's fine, Commander." She finally says, when he's casually standing between her and the exit. "You already know which station."

And, with that, he's gone.

Monkey still thinks he's weird.


	3. Chapter 3

"I jinxed it." Monkey says, nearly dropping Boar's coffee into his lap in her rush to get the words out. She's still sort of shaken from being accosted so suddenly by Hound, but she knows how to hide the stress. They can probably see it anyway. "I totally jinxed it."

"Does that mean I owe you one or one fifty?" He replies, the soft smile he's sporting behind the intimidating mask evident in his voice. They're being visibly conspicuous, and for good reason. Boar and Rat have parked themselves on the front steps of Naruto's apartment, the Captain's mask tipped to the side. Anyone who knows him is going to recognize the scarring that pinches the visible parts of his face and neck. It's a threat. So is the cigarette between his fingers, lazily curling smoke into the dark sky.

Monkey glances at it in disapproval.

"Come off it." He drawls, either catching her miniscule tells or sensing her displeasure. Considering how long they've been a team, it's probably the latter. "I ran into Sparrow on the way over. Kid doesn't pull his punches when it comes to this shit."

Boar chuckles, leaning back against the dirty siding. His fingers dance around the rim of the disposable cup, distracted.

"Eta's definitely out for blood, then. You know what happened last time they went on a warpath." He says. Monkey gets a brief flash of his clan markings when Boar lifts his mask to sip at the coffee, and a quietly appreciative sound afterward. Rat groans, dropping his head into his hands. He still hasn't reached for the cup like she knows he wants to. She holds it out instead, giving him time to put out the cigarette and shove the rest of it into his pocket.

"If the entire squad doesn't know by the time we reach Missions, I'd be surprised." Rat says. It draws another laugh out of Boar, who bumps his shoulder against the Captain's.

"Between Hound lurking everywhere and Sparrow's gossip, that's impossible." The door behind them jerks open and closes with an almost slam. Bear looks more ruffled than Monkey's ever seen her, black hair a veritable pigeon's nest and a tired droop to her shoulders. And she's seen her teammate almost bleed out more gracefully than take the first step down.

"Babysitting him should be classified as A-rank." Bear says without prompting.

"Find a new hanger-on outside of your baby cousins?" Monkey teases. Bear makes an annoyed noise but accepts the offered cup with a mumbled thanks. Boar and Rat rise to their feet, the former steadying their teammate when she almost stumbles. She pauses on the bottom step, probably scrunching her face up if Monkey's guess is right.

"My cousin's going to be even more insufferable when he finds out." She sighs.

Rat's already leading them toward the tower in the rough formation that's been beaten into their heads by pure, mind-numbing repetition. It doesn't matter that they are well within the village walls, or that their charge is safe behind a locked door and a couple seals. Not when it's against their gut instincts.The village around them is quiet, for what it's worth, wary of the ANBU operatives presenting themselves so openly. Active shinobi dart across the rooftops, because Konoha never truly sleeps, barely making any sounds aside from the displacement of air and soft clatter of tiles.

"Crane's a good kid." Boar says as they near their destination. "He's got a good head on his shoulders."

"He'd have a better one if he could keep his beak out of matters that don't concern him." Bear growls. The line of conversation is dropped immediately. Monkey rolls her eyes behind the mask, pushing open the door to the Missions Desk without hesitation.

Bear, like most of the squad, tends to get just a little too caught up in clan drama. 

The chuunin manning the desk looks up, a bored look on her face, and greets them in a monotone. Their report is brief, with Monkey's pre-written incident report helping speed the matter along, and the dismissal is more than welcomed. Let Nine-Fourteen deal with Hound and his insanely overprotective team - it wouldn't be the first time they've relieved them of becoming punching bags for the older squad.

Five-Seven-One disperses.


End file.
